I can't help but shake my head at the amount of injuries this year... Yes, maybe starting this thread has made me see them more, but on the other hand, one of the reasons I did start it, was that there were so many injuries, I couldn't keep track of them all! Honestly... (just shakes head, speechless)

I can't help but shake my head at the amount of injuries this year... Yes, maybe starting this thread has made me see them more, but on the other hand, one of the reasons I did start it, was that there were so many injuries, I couldn't keep track of them all! Honestly... (just shakes head, speechless)

I think that the continuous increasing of the difficulty required to get level 4 elements is partly responsible for the increase in injuries.
Each season the skaters have to add more and more tricks, especially in pairs and dance.
In dance, the girls are starting to need to have the same weight and size as pairs skaters to enable the boy to throw them around into various positions like rag dolls! It's becoming way too acrobatic for my liking......

"Lipnitskaia qualified for the Grand Prix Final in Sochi but withdrew due to injury: during training, she lost balance on the entry to a spin, split her chin and sustained a slight concussion. Doctors advised that she not compete and to stay off the ice for at least two weeks. However, according to the latest news, she needs more time for the complete recovery."

" "“I have only resumed doing quads here in Sochi,” he explained. “A month ago, I underwent a surgery and it resulted in a major drop in my physical conditioning. So it was only here, basically yesterday and today, that I managed to land a first couple of quads. I am especially happy that I did it, even though I failed to land a clean one during the warm up.” "

Also:

"The student of Alexei Mishin credits intense training early in the season for his recent bout of health issues.

“I have attempted too many jumps early in this season,” Plushenko stated. “I started to land quad Salchows, begun working on the quad Lutz… I am not young any longer.”

“Truth to be told, I have already forgotten when I competed healthy,” he lamented. “Fortunately, I know pretty well how to skate while injured, through pain. I have year of experience in tolerating it.” "

“I am very happy with my performance, but I had to fight for it,” admitted the 2006 Olympic Champion. “Yesterday, I said that the long program would be much harder and the prediction turned out to be true. My back ached and I had to skate through this pain.”

“It almost feels like going home,” joked Plushenko, who at the age of 30, and days before becoming a father for the second time, combines a Zen-like detachment with a sense of invincibility that would make any teenager proud.

“It was a thermal treatment of a disk hernia,” he explained about the surgery. “They make a cut, enter a catheter, and can follow the process on a monitor. Surgeons sear the hernia with a special liquid under general anesthesia. You are not allowed do anything for ten days. I was back on the ice in seven.”

“After the surgery, the doctors told me to stay off ice for a month,” he added. “However, it was not for me. As usual, I had to jump the gun. I felt that need to run fast in order to defend my position. I had the National Championships coming up, so, not only did I start to train too early, but I started to train too intensely.”

As a result, complications arose which required another medical intervention, this time closer to home.

“I got an injection, a block, in St. Petersburg at a presidential clinic,” he said.

Unsurprisingly, his physical condition plummeted.

“I am a grown up man, but I cried in practices because I was not able to do anything,” revealed the three-time World champion. “I was not able to land a triple loop, triple Salchow, or triple Lutz. I had to start from the scratch. All the progress I had achieved this summer … it was gone. I felt like giving up.”

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The next stop for the ten-time National Champion is another visit to a doctor’s office.

“This was the most important National title in my career,” he said. “The circumstances were very difficult. I wanted to withdraw. Or, more accurately, to withdraw would have been a right thing to do at the time. So, now I will take a short break and I will have another injection in St. Petersburg and let the doctors work their magic on me.”

“Then I will prepare for the Europeans,” he continued. “The rivals will be strong, so I have to bring back two quads and a quad-triple combination. I think my muscles are up to the task, but everything depends on my back now.” "

There is more in the article, of course - I tried to keep this to what is most health-related.

Gachinski gave an interview in Russian to a site called "All Sport", where he tried to explain what is going wrong with him:

“I strongly numb legs and appear very uncomfortable. It started last year, but then it was not so pronounced. Doctors say flat - CLOTHING insole. Influence rather than that, and a strange lack of preparation before each rental. The disease, the common cold, then something else.

Need to understand yourself, and then go to the gym. Confidence seems to come, I’m all figured out, but on the ice until it fails to reflect “

"The season started roughly on me and recovering period took longer than doctors and I were expecting. 3,5 weeks with no skating made me realize how strong my dedication to sport is and how much I love what I do!

Fortunately, I'm back on ice now, I started training and last month has been very productive. I did a wonderful show in Germany and held the seminar for young skaters in Kazakhstan which went very very well!

I look forward to start competing soon and my first event may be in just one week."

Thanks Butterscotch17! It sounds as if his injury has made him even more keen to come back and show what he can do - it's nice to see that he's turning it into something positive, refuelling his fire. (What little I've seen, he overall seems like quite a positive guy.)

This is a young person's game. It seems like it is just not possible to subject your body to that kind of punishment for a decade.

Maybe they should change the rules to put less of a premium on jumps and elevate other aspects of skating instead. You could think of it in the same way as requiring hockey players to wear helmets -- less macho, more common sense.